Kaisoku’s luggage was genuinely minimal—beyond a laptop and a drawing tablet, she didn’t really own anything of value.
She dragged a single suitcase out of the room Satono Diamond had prepared for her, and under Diamond’s reluctant gaze, after some heavy negotiating, finally made it onto the bus bound for Umamusume Manor.
On the ride, she didn’t forget to text Kitasan Black confirming she’d made it safely.
As a girl with no father, no mother, no younger sister, no house of her own—a card-carrying member of the four-nothings class—she was really only here by virtue of her friends’ support.
Moving into Tracen, at least, gave her a place to call her own, which in its own way counted as good news.
The girl had wanted to gradually become more independent—but Diamond, treating her like a precious daughter of the house, had given zero thought to letting her rent an apartment somewhere out there.
Besides—the counter-argument, why rent some apartment out there when you can just live at the Satono house, was on nearly every axis unimpeachable.
Living conditions at the Satonos’ were infinitely better than anything she could have afforded.
And despite staying less than a week, Kaisoku had been thoroughly audited from every angle by every member of the family.
Thankfully, her scores came back passing all around.
Diamond’s parents, siblings, everyone rated her highly.
By the end of the week, they were treating her like a Satono.
Even Miss Satono Crown, if she ran out for pudding, would grab an extra one for Kaisoku.
They had completely stopped treating her as a guest.
Diamond’s parents had even floated the idea, cautiously—if Kaisoku was willing, they could formally adopt her.
That one, Diamond vetoed on the spot.
Kaisoku understood where Diamond was coming from.
A friend becoming a sister overnight would inevitably bring awkward moments.
And family wasn’t something that could simply be bolted on with an adoption paper.
From any angle, Diamond’s objection to her parents’ offer was reasonable.
Kaisoku went along with Diamond’s wishes and declined.
It hadn’t affected her standing in the Satono household in the slightest.
Oh, incidentally—based on her observation, the lowest-ranked person in the Satono household was the father.
Top of the pyramid was the mother.
Below the mother was Diamond.
Then Miss Crown.
Then the family’s Persian cat.
Then, finally, the father.
Since Kaisoku moved in, she had successfully reached the same ecological niche as the cat.
Reduced to cat-tier, Kaisoku shed silent internal tears.
Though, put that way, the father—whose niche was lower than the cat’s—was the real tragedy.
Outside of the moment he pulled out the wallet and radiated peak masculine vigor, he was doing every last dish and meal at home.
The mother looked a lot more like the real head of the household.
The Satonos were a warm family.
Dad and Mom were entrepreneurs who had built a successful company, and the home atmosphere reflected it.
Busy as they were, neither skimped on time with Diamond and Crown.
There was none of the classic absentee-parent pattern of traditional wealthy households.
As the baby of the family, Diamond was especially doted on.
Crown would occasionally vent to Kaisoku that Diamond was hopelessly spoiled—but Crown was as guilty of doing the spoiling as anyone.
Kaisoku could only smile and nod along.
Diamond’s diamond-bright personality was, truly, wholly the product of this warm household.
Kaisoku envied a family like that.
In her previous life, she’d had something similar.
Not as wealthy, but as the only daughter in the house, she’d been loved exactly this much.
Even her normally stern father, upon discovering she’d filled in an art academy on her university preferences, hadn’t raised a hand against her.
He had only sighed, long and heavy, and stepped outside for a cigarette.
Thinking about that again, the girl felt a dull ache start up.
She dabbed at the corner of her eye, trying to hold the tears back.
A tissue appeared beside her.
“Are you alright?” The umamusume now crouched next to her had chestnut-brown long hair and was wearing a face mask.
Her outfit read delinquent, but her voice had a faint tremor in it—like someone not used to talking to people.
The kindness in the gesture drew a small warm current through Kaisoku’s chest.
She took the tissue and dabbed at the tears she hadn’t meant to let fall.
“Thank you…
um?”
“It’s fine, I’m glad.
Sorry—I just saw you looking really upset.
Are you maybe a runaway?” the masked umamusume asked.
“I think about running away from home a lot, actually.
The atmosphere at my place is hard.
I don’t like being there, but…
however you look at it, running away probably isn’t really the right call.”
“No, I’m not a runaway…” Kaisoku shook her head.
Something about the sideways turn had magically dispelled her sadness.
For Kaisoku, was grief a channeled spell that could just get interrupted mid-cast?
“To be precise—I don’t even have a ‘home’ in the first place.”
“…Ah, I’m sorry…
I didn’t mean to bring up something painful.” The masked umamusume sat down beside her, wanting to comfort her, not quite sure how to start.
“It’s okay.
I’m okay now.” Kaisoku waved it off.
“I just think about it sometimes.
I can get through this kind of thing on my own.”
“That must be hard, though…” the girl said.
“Living alone in Tokyo has to be rough.”
“Very rough…” Kaisoku nodded emphatically.
“The prices here are absurd.
Can’t even afford a watermelon.
Though some things are strangely cheap—bean sprouts, for instance.”
“Bean sprouts alone will leave you malnourished.” The girl cracked a small laugh at that, which relaxed Kaisoku too.
“If you don’t have anywhere to go, how about you come to my place?
It’s school-assigned housing, but I’m pretty sure there are still some empty rooms.
If I put in a word with the manager, she might let you stay.”
“I do have a place to go, actually—also school-assigned…” Kaisoku clarified quickly.
“Not quite at the homeless stage.
I am still enrolled.”
Just enrolled at Tōdai—the girl quietly omitted that last part.
She didn’t want to conjure a gulf out of nothing right as the conversation was going so smoothly.
Like hanging out in a group chat full of single people trading self-deprecating jokes, and suddenly a normie starts posting pictures of themselves with their girlfriend—a pathetic thick barrier materializes on the spot.
In that moment, you want nothing more than to One-Punch the flex-poster into the next dimension.
There probably wasn’t a One-Punch Man lurking around among umamusume—but tossing out certain things mid-conversation could absolutely still freeze a room.
The two of them kept talking, and the more they spoke, the more in sync they were.
They really were alike—both socially anxious, both easily flustered.
Their family situations were both complicated (though, technically, having no family whatsoever counted as its own kind of complicated).
The whole bus ride, they did a full mutual vibe check, and even swapped Line IDs by the end.
But happy moments were always the fleeting kind.
Kaisoku’s stop arrived too soon.
She stood up reluctantly—and the girl beside her stood up at the same time.
The two of them looked at each other.
Kaisoku asked first.
“Are you getting off here too?”
“Mm…
my place is right around here.” She nodded.
“If we live close, hanging out again will be easy.
That’s pretty fateful, actually.”
“Yeah…” Kaisoku was already getting a bad feeling.
They stepped off together, exchanged goodbyes at first—then realized they were walking in the same direction.
There was still hope: maybe their routes just happened to overlap for a stretch.
But when the two of them arrived at the front gate of Umamusume Manor, Kaisoku’s hope had fully disintegrated.
“…What a coincidence.
You live at Umamusume Manor too?” The masked girl hadn’t fully registered what was happening yet.
“You’re a new student as well?”
“…Mm…
ah…
I guess so…” Kaisoku nodded numbly.
“Um…
I don’t think I ever asked your name.”
“Oh, right.
My name is Orfevre.
Pleased to meet you.” The girl gave a small nod, finally realizing the two of them hadn’t exchanged names.
But the fact they could both be this oblivious for this long pretty much proved they were made for each other.
“Hello…
my name is Toujou Kaisoku…”
“Ah…
you’re the one from Tōdai…”
“Please DON’T call me that!!” Kaisoku’s defenses shattered on the spot.
They were roommates?!
And Orfevre—wasn’t Orfevre that weirdo Gold Ship’s—
“Yo—Maestro, you’re back~ I just scored some mystery-flavor jellybeans from the convenience store!
Let’s do the jellybean challenge tonight, yeah?” Gold Ship came breezing in from the opposite direction and casually greeted Orfevre.
“I refuse.” Orfevre crossed her arms into a defensive X and flatly turned it down.
It’s really fun.” Gold Ship was about to needle Orfevre further when she caught sight of Kaisoku, face stone-cold beside her.
“Oh!
Isn’t this the Tōdai girl?
What a coincidence!”
“…Ah…
y-yeah.
What a coincidence.” Kaisoku sighed wordlessly at the sky.
“Um…
if you don’t need me for anything, I’ll head to my room.”
“Since you’re here anyway, come eat with us.
Miss Star O’s cooking is amazing.” Gold Ship grabbed Kaisoku—who had tried to escape a fraction of a second too late.
“We’re all under one roof now, Tōdai girl, you’ve gotta get along with us!”
“I’m ALLERGIC to socializing!” Kaisoku would rather die than get entangled with a weirdo like Gold Ship, but her struggles were completely ignored.
Gold Ship was tall and strong—one hand each for Orfevre and Kaisoku, she lifted both clean off the ground and marched straight through the door.
“Think of it as exposure therapy, it’ll be fine.
Worst case you eat one booger-flavored jellybean!”
“Who the hell would want to eat THAT!”
“Let go of me!
Ship!
I swear I’m gonna hit you!”
The two writhed to no effect—Gold Ship’s iron grip did not waver.
Against Gold Ship, two small-statured umamusume simply didn’t have the mass.
Never mind a Lin Daiyu-tier fragile noodle like Kaisoku—even Orfevre couldn’t match Gold Ship in raw strength.
“Mm, that smells amazing—Miss Star O, sukiyaki tonight?!” Gold Ship, hauling two thoroughly-zoned-out umamusume, sniffed the air as she barreled in.
Her divine nose identified the dish the instant she caught the scent, and she marched cheerfully into the dining room like a farmhand hauling in a chicken and a duck.
“Yes~ we have to properly welcome the new arrival to the Manor~ Hey, Ship—what’s in your hands?” The short-haired umamusume—a flawlessly respectable beauty radiating full-on mom energy—rose to greet them.
“Is this our new resident?”
“Yep~~ it’s the Tōdai girl.
She was being shy, so I nabbed her along with Maestro!”
“I see~ Then everyone, take your seats.
In a minute, Ship, you go drag Digital-chan and Tachyon-chan and Cafe-chan down too, okay~” Sakura Star O smiled and clapped her hands softly together.
In that moment she was a true-to-life Yamato Nadeshiko, voice gentle even as she issued her orders.
“The welcome dinner for Umamusume Manor’s new resident—everyone must be present~”
“Roger~” Gold Ship dumped Kaisoku and Orfevre into their chairs and thundered up the stairs to summon the other three.
Kaisoku, just emerging from under Gold Ship’s tyranny, let out a quiet sigh at her fellow victim across the table.
They really were alike—both of them crushed flat under Gold Ship.
If the two of them qualified as socially anxious, Gold Ship was a social terrorist.
Even Kaisoku’s Tōdai-tier brain couldn’t predict what Gold Ship was going to say or do from one second to the next.
That was the real terror.
The single most frightening thing in existence was pure randomness.
Wrung out from the manhandling, Kaisoku summoned just enough strength to look at the bubbling sukiyaki pot in front of her.
Each gurgling bubble carried the essence of rich umami.
It looked delicious.
Looking at it, she couldn’t help but think of the hotpot she used to share with her family on holidays in her previous life.
That same steam, rising the same way, indistinguishable.
She drew a breath and pulled herself out of the memory, then walked over to Sakura Star O, still busy at the stove.
“Is there anything I can help with?
Just waiting to eat feels wrong somehow.” Kaisoku asked carefully.
“I can chop vegetables—kitchen work is fine.
So…
let me help out.”
“Aww~~” Sakura Star O smiled down at the little junior in front of her—the one who radiated fragility from every pore and still somehow carried the most stubborn, unyielding pair of eyes.
Her smile warmed another shade.
“Well now~ Ten was right about you.
You really are a good kid.”
“Eh?” Kaisoku blinked.
She hadn’t expected her own boss’s name to surface in Sakura Star O’s mouth.
“Wait—is Miss Ten Point also a really impressive umamusume?”
“How to put it—she’s a very senior sempai of mine.
When she heard you were coming to my house, she pulled me aside at a drinks party and personally asked me to take good care of you.” Sakura Star O wiped her hands on her apron, then gently cupped Kaisoku’s face.
“All right, all right, come help.
The main cooking is mostly done, but you can chop some scallions and sprinkle them on top.
Careful with your fingers, okay?”
“Okay.” Kaisoku took up the knife with renewed confidence, pouring her own small effort into this fragrant pot of sukiyaki.
She wasn’t actually trying to be a hermit.
If there was a way to be part of something, she would lean into it.
After all—Mom had always said: Be a warm person.